Considerable value to have the president, the new council protected prohibition orders based on breed: Shanmugam

Singapore – It is considerable to ensure that the president is a control over the government’s powers to issue non-restriction orders to maintain racial harmony, said the Minister of the Interior and the Minister of Law K. Shanmugam.

And it is appropriate because the president is directly elected by the Singaporeans, he added, Stressing that the law on internal security and the law on the maintenance of religious harmony adopt a similar model.

The Minister responded to the concerns raised by the President of the Workers’ Party (WP), Sylvia Lim, on the new presidential powers proposed in the modifications of the Constitution. Parliament adopted these changes, as well as a bill to maintain racial harmony on February 4 after a five -hour debate.

Constitutional changes – against which the WP voted – were made to introduce guarantees On the prohibition order regime under the bill on the maintenance of racial harmony, which allows the government to act quickly and preventive against the content which threatens racial harmony.

They grant a new council – the presidential council for racial and religious harmony – the ability to review content orders and advise if they are appropriate, the president deciding whether to act on the councils of the council.

Ms. Lim said her party argued the bill on racial harmony, but not the support bill to modify the Constitution, because it is not the responsibility of the president to maintain peace and the public order because he is not responsible before the Parliament.

Noting that the mechanism proposed for the president to examine the reservoirs has “significant risks”, she said that this could lead to a scenario where the government cannot be blamed for unfavorable social results resulting from an order of ‘Prohibition canceled.

“Let us say that it turns out later that the organization concerned had really become a proxy for a hostile foreign actor, or that racial relations are deteriorating strongly, proving that the minister was justified to make the retention order in First place, “she told Parliament.

“When the Singaporeans question the decision-making process, the government can rightly say that it has correctly issued the non-contential order, but since the (elected president) has decided to cancel it, the government should not not be blamed for bad results. “

She also said that there were serious implications to bring the president to decisions involving ethnicity, given that the role is supposed to be a symbol of unity and the personification of the state.

“The fact of forcing him to make difficult decisions on the questions involving ethnicity to harm his role of unifying figure above politics,” she said. She also noted that it would be a source of division and very harmful to the company if the president uses the provision to cancel a prohibition order because of his ethnic roots.

The seven deputies of the WP present during the session of February 4 opposed the modifications to the law. But the bill was adopted as 78 deputies, composing at least two thirds of the representatives in the House, voted in favor of changes. No one has refrained from voting.

Mr. Shanmugam responded to Ms. Lim saying that the decision to implement these additional guarantees is “a question of judgment”.

He said: “In the end, if the system really works depends on the integrity of the people involved, all along – the Minister, the Council, the President, the Parliament, everywhere.

“The presidential council, by calling on senior leaders of the religious and profane community, can provide additional rigor to the process.”

Mr. Shanmugam also said that the changes had not been proposed with the conviction that the presidential council and the president were never disagreement with the minister.

It would be an “untenable assumption,” he said.

“We are building executives and institutions that, we hope, will see Singapore over a long period, and all of this is part of the institution’s building which takes place in the past 60 years,” he added .

Ms. Lim replied that if the government does not hold the president’s agreement for acquired, it cannot be updated that the president can disagree and cancel a justified prohibition order.

“Isn’t (the minister) not fear that this regime of risking the risk (elected president) will be polarized here according to racial lines?” She said.

In response, Mr. Shanmugam underlined a “curious reversal of roles”, observing that he pleaded for an additional layer of checks on the government, while Ms. Lim questioned the need for additional checks because he brought the president to the melee.

Rather, the mechanism allows members of the presidential council – who are exceptional members of the community – pool their collective wisdom to advise the president if a deduction order lacks substance, he said.

“The president himself is elected by the people, and in this sense, he has a mandate; He is responsible before the people themselves, while the Minister continues to be responsible for Parliament, and of course, for the public’s judgment, “he added.

In the end, it is a question of finding a balance, he reiterated.

“If you have too many checks and counterweights, nothing is done. If you don’t have checks and counterweights, it can sometimes be wrong. So we try to find a balance, and this is the best answer I can give, “he said.

• Wong Pei Ting is a correspondent at the time of the Strait. It covers policy and social affairs.

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